1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to the area of kitchen technology. In particular, the invention refers to the construction of a kitchen workplate as a cooking field, which combines the functions of a cooking stove and of a workplate in a novel fashion.
2. Brief Description of the Background of the Invention Including Prior Art
For a long time the open flame has been the most important source for the feeding of heat required during cooking.
The reason for this, with the exception of grilling (radiation heat), is associated less with the flame itself, but is connected with the purely technical fact that a change of the feeding of heat can be induced very quickly. Here, the most important reason is to be found why the top gastronomical chefs still cook with gas. For example, if one switches the gas flame off during cooking, then the feeding of heat is instantly interrupted. This is not possible in connection with a conventional electric plate cooking field or with a conventional glass ceramic cook field based on the after-heating effect of the heated electric spirals. The automatic control of the feeding of heat with gas occurs substantially more spontaneous. A quick regulation and automatic control of the fed heat, however, is of a decisive interest in connection with the use of temperature-sensitive ingredients, which obtain the desired consistency only in case of a well-metered heat treatment, such as for example in the preparation of sauces with a high fat content.
Despite the indispensability in connection with cooking, gas stoves are associated with the disadvantage that a substantially mechanical expenditure has to be provided for the generation of the flame on the cooking field in order to be able to furnish an accident-proof gas flame.
Organic materials, such as splashes of fat and food residues, deposit on these mechanical parts during cooking operations, which are then burnt into the gas burners on the cooking field by the flame. Overall, the gas cooking field (burner, recess) and the grate required for positioning the pots on the flame are cleaned only with difficulty and are accompanied by substantial time expenditures.
The sticking of burnt-on food residues and fats occurs also in connection with the electric stove, as well as in case of glass-ceramic cooking fields, which react with sensitivity to the burnt-on organic materials upon a long-term use and which are therefore more and more difficult to clean with increasing age based on the damaging of the surface. Glass-ceramic cooking fields are further exhibiting the property that they are sensitive to breakage upon occurrences of strokes and jolts.
Based on the method of magnetic induction it is possible to transfer energy through a suitable medium such as, for example, glass ceramics. This method is used in connection with modern inductive cooking fields, where a magnetic flux is generated in a suitable pot material through a glass-ceramic plate, where the magnetic flux directly heats the pot and where the heat is no longer transferred from the cooking field to the pot but, to the contrary, the heat is generated in the pot itself and only subsequently the residual heat is radiated back to the cooking field. This method achieves as a positive side effect, on the one hand, a clear reduction of the heat loss overall generated during the cooking process. However, on the other hand, much more important for the cooking itself is the fact that a change of the inducing flux has a spontaneous effect on the change of the fed-in energy just as occurs during the cooking with gas.
The magnetic flux is generated by a simple coil in connection with an inductive stove, wherein the coil is passed through by a high-frequency alternating current. The feed-in of energy can be controlled very finely metered and based on a suitable, commercially available electronic circuit.
Since in this context primarily the pot is heated, the time-dependent behavior of the change of the energy feed to the cooked materials is similarly direct as in the case of cooking with gas and, in general, even better.
An important step in connection with the development of modern kitchen technology was the introduction of kitchen workplates, which are today already employed as standard, which provide a homogeneous surface for the free operating continuously above the various bases such as cabinets, refrigerators, washing machines or dish washing machines and which are simple to clean based on the lack of interfering corners, edges, and open seams. In addition, an easily surveillable and flexibly organizable kitchen operation becomes possible.
In most recent times, stone, in particular granite, has proven to be an indestructible material for such workplaces. For example, one can cut with knives on the stone without leaving a scratch. The cleaning of granite is very simple based on the smooth and hard surface, since dirt and residues cannot really adhere even in case of an intensive use and a strong drying. Should this nevertheless happen, then these residues can be removed with hard objects without damaging the surface of the granite plate.
Such kitchen workplates are however still interrupted today by the cooking field, recessed in the plate, which still creates transitions in the region of the stove which are difficult to clean completely, and in particular prevents the user, based on the relatively sensitive surfaces of glass ceramics, from using the cooking field itself as a working field with the above recited advantages.